


Secret Comfort

by MizzAdamz



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adult Severus Snape, Child Severus Snape, Comfort, F/M, Gen, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, POV Severus Snape, comfort items
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 13:47:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28511397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MizzAdamz/pseuds/MizzAdamz
Summary: Mam didn’t know he put it on. She hadn’t seen him this morning. Not really. She ruffled his hair and kissed the tip of his nose while pushing him to the door.Da was working today and Mam wanted to make the house tidy, she was going to use her wand and didn’t want Da or him to know she was doing it.They both kept secrets. It was the Slytherin way.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Severus Snape
Comments: 9
Kudos: 85
Collections: Hearts and Cauldrons Discord Members





	Secret Comfort

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to @AmiMendal for being a fantastic Beta.

Mam didn’t know he put it on. She hadn’t seen him this morning. Not really. She ruffled his hair and kissed the tip of his nose while pushing him to the door.

Da was working today and Mam wanted to make the house tidy, she was going to use her wand and didn’t want Da or him to know she was doing it. 

They both kept secrets. It was the Slytherin way.

The fabric was soft against his skin, nicer than the scratchy shirts that he usually had to wear. It had pretty round buttons that shimmered in the light, and the lace on the collar made it special. It was clean and smelled of the good washing powder Mam used when dad was away, the good washing powder and sunshine. 

It was his Mam’s good blouse but Severus felt so strong wearing it. It was right when everything else in the world sometimes wasn’t. 

Maybe today he would see the girls playing; it was a good day to wear his strong blouse. Maybe today he’d ask them to play with him.   


* * *

Da had caught him in the blouse today and tried to take it off of him. Mam had defended him and sewed it back up. Tiny neat stitches on the arm and the collar in ivory thread. 

Mam sang as she sewed, listening to the wireless and then washed it and hung it on the line to dry, capturing the sunshine.

“Your Da don’t know the power of things, petal.” She told him. “It’s hard for him to understand our world. So what we are going to do is; I’m going to get you a nice black blazer, sturdy wool your Da will approve of, and when you need to wear this,” she folded the blouse neatly and put it in the chest at the foot of his bed, “you wear the blazer. Your Da won’t notice it and you can keep it close.”

Mam knew the best way to keep secrets, the Slytherin way.

He wore that wool blazer almost every day.  


* * *

He was still small compared to the other kids in the park, but the blouse was getting tight in the shoulders. 

Mam had replaced the wool blazer each summer when the muggle schools let out and people were getting rid of their old uniforms. Mam knew just how to get a good deal.

Mam suggested getting him a few white shirts each time she got him a new blazer, but none had the magic of Mam’s strong blouse. He couldn’t wear it every day anymore, though. It was getting hard to move in it.

Then Mam had one of her brilliant ideas again. She got a few of the old school shirts to go with the wool blazers, but she replaced the cold plastic flat buttons on the shirts with round buttons like the ones on her blouse.

“You can’t stop growing my love, but we can bring a little of the magic over,” she said as she winked at him. 

He sometimes slept with the shirt under his cheek to absorb some of its magic.   
It wasn’t as strong as wearing it every day, but it was something.

Mam would always wash it, dry it in the sun and put it under his flat pillow. She always replaced the buttons on his new shirts.

It was their own secret.  


* * *

When his Hogwarts letter came, Mam was excited, but Da was having none of it. He didn’t want to pay for the fancy clothes and wanted his son to have a good, steady, working man’s job.

Mam did her Slytherin secret magic and convinced Da that he should go. This was going to be good for their boy. He would get a good education and be able to get a good job.  
She also told him that there was a scholarship and they would only have to pay for his wand and shoes; the rest, the school covered.

Da didn’t like it, but he accepted it when Mam said that there was a special branch of the government that made sure kids like him got into the school.

If there was anything Da hated more than toffee nosed prats, it was the government.

They went shopping that weekend and Mam got him four new shirts and she didn’t need to change the buttons; they were all round and neat and shiny. They were from the seconds bin, but he and Mam knew that sometimes there is more magic in the less-than-perfect things.

When he got home, he lifted his pillow and looked at Mam’s strong blouse. He needed to put it away now. He had strong blouses of his own.

So he gave it one last rub on his cheek and put it back into the trunk at the foot of his bed.

He had his own magic now. He didn’t need his Mam’s.  


* * *

Hogwarts was strange and wonderful, but also just as terrible as home. 

He did get sorted into Slytherin, like Mam and he had always hoped and planned, but Lily didn’t. 

That first night away from home, knowing she was so far above him in the castle, still smarting from the bruises that toffee-nosed prat Potter had given him, he felt lost. 

He opened his school trunk and went looking for one of his Mam’s books to read when he saw it.   
Mam had packed her strong blouse into his trunk!

He looked around himself to see if anyone was watching - no one was - they were also moving things about their new dorm. So he lifted the blouse and pressed it against his cheek. It smelled of the good washing power and sunshine.

Severus walked to the head of his bed and placed the blouse under his pillow.  
He then put his grey nightshirt on top of it.

If anyone asked why he had his Mam’s blouse, he could say it got mixed up in the laundry.

It was nice to have it though; it was a comfortable secret.  


* * *

Damned Potter and Black, and Remus, Remus just let them do that! Toffee Nosed Pillocks, Posh brats, the lot of them. 

And Lily, oh Lily.

She’ll never forgive him. Never. 

Exhausted from sitting up by the Gryffindor dorms all night and he still had to go to his last few classes. He just couldn’t do this on his own.

He made his way back to his own dorm, his dorm mates already gone for breakfast. He went to change his shirt for a clean one when he saw it, crumpled in a bundle where he had hidden it after the incident he wasn’t allowed to speak of.

He couldn’t stop himself as he picked up the rumpled fabric and brought it to his face. It was cool on his cheek but smelled off. The house-elves didn’t use the same washing powder, and they didn’t dry clothes in the sunshine. 

There were traces of the old magic on the fabric, and the buttons still shimmered, but it wasn’t the same.

He closed his dry eyes, unsurprised that even this talisman had lost its magic, but he didn’t remove it from his face for a long time.  


* * *

“Severus, what’s this?” Hermione asked him, holding up Mam’s strong blouse.

They were moving in together and she was trying to organise her way out of her stress.   
The brave little whirlwind couldn’t rest if there was a mess around. It was best to let her have her head most times.

“It is a blouse, I’m sure you can tell that, or do you need to borrow Potter’s glasses?”

“I know that, by why is it in your trunk of bedroom things?” she asked, folding the blouse up neatly. “Is it a token from a past romance? Someone from which I need to defend my territory?” 

Her voice was light-hearted and washed through him with a warmth that he still couldn’t believe the fates allowed him to have.

“Hardly; it was my mother’s.” He turned back to the shelf of books he was organising for her.

“Oh, that is so sweet!” Hermione gushed. “Did she pack it for you when you left for Hogwarts, so you wouldn’t be too lonely?”

“Something like that,” he said, tipping his head forward to hide the blush on his cheeks.

“I have my dad’s old work shirt. It’s so threadbare now, I dare not wash it. I think that first year at Hogwarts and the year after the war I lived in it.” She hummed as she worked, placing the blouse on the bed beside some of his sleep shirts.

“You had a shirt too?” Severus asked.

“Yup, some kids have teddies or blankets, I have a shirt.” She giggled, “I called it my armour! I wore it when I needed to feel brave.” Hermione walked over to him, kissed him on the tip of his nose and walked on to their shared wardrobe.

She bent down and Severus admired the view as she rummaged around in the wardrobe's bottom.

“Here it is!” she exclaimed and backed out, carrying a brown bundle of cloth. When she straightened, she unfurled it and held up a brown check shirt that was almost transparent. It had round pearlised snaps down the front.

“Before you and I got serious, I was sleeping with this under my pillow every day. I stopped wearing it not too long ago because it is really thin now.”

“I know a preserving charm that can save it, should you wish it.”

“YOU DO!” Hermione launched herself at him and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Oh Severus, please, that would be amazing!” She started peppering his face with kisses and thanking him.

He had done nothing special, really; it was just a charm he had come up with years ago for his Mam’s strong blouse. He hadn’t even used it for her shirt yet.

He returned her kisses though, and they didn’t get to use the charm, or unpack more boxes that afternoon.  


* * *

“What perfume did your mother wear?” Hermione asked him over tea.

“My mother didn’t wear a scent. We weren’t that posh, Hermione.”

“Oh.” She deflated a little and picked at her sausages for a little. Then, as she chewed, her eyes lit up, and she swallowed animatedly. “What washing powder did she use?”

“Most times it was carbolic soap, but on special occasions she would use Persil, if I recall.”

“You don’t talk about your mother much, or your father.”

“There isn’t much to say,” he said, cutting his own sausage into bite-sized pieces. “Mam was a housewife who tried to ignore her magic, Da was a mill worker who got the short shrift when the clean air act made it that fewer folks were buying coke. They died before I left Hogwarts.”

“Oh Severus,” Hermione reached over and put her hand on his wrist. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t cause their deaths Hermione, you weren’t even born.”

“Doesn’t mean I don’t feel bad about your loss.” She scooted her chair over to be closer to him and leaned against him while he ate his food. She rubbed her hand over his back and nuzzled his shoulder, trying to offer him comfort.

He gave in and turned his face to her and breathed in her hair, Posh soap and sunshine, and Hermione.

It was a different magic, but it was magic nonetheless, and he felt stronger for it.  


* * *

“What is this?” he asked, lifting his pillow and finding his Mam’s strong blouse on top of his nightshirt.

“I washed your mother’s blouse for you. It has probably been in the bottom of that chest for ages. I thought you might like to have it," Hermione said, lifting her own pillow and showing him her father’s brown shirt folded neatly under her pillow. “After you did that charm on my dad’s shirt, I wanted to thank you.”

“Hermione — “ he said.

“Smell it Severus, please.” She bounced on her toes, excited. He rolled his eyes and lifted the cloth to his face, trying to indulge her. He took a breath in and his eyes widened. 

He breathed in again and his childhood came rushing back to him. With the smell of good washing powder and sunshine, he remembered his Mam sewing new buttons on second-hand shirts, of sitting under a tree with his best friend, of the joys of simple secrets and the strong comfort of his Mam’s magic.

“How?” he asked, still holding the fabric to his face. 

“Persil’s unscented non-bio is pretty much the same as it was when you were a kid. I just hand washed it with a little of the soap and hung it out on the line to dry. It was a bright day, and I wanted to take advantage of the sunshine.”

“This was unnecessary,” he groused and folded the blouse back up. “It’s just a blouse, Hermione.”

“Of course it is just a blouse Severus.” She leaned over the bed and gave him a kiss on the tip of his nose. “But it is just your blouse.”

She walked out of the room to go brush her teeth. 

Severus lifted the fabric to his nose again and breathed in, a soft smile in his eyes.

* * *

It was useless; no one was ever going to see him as anything other than the Darklord’s lapdog, murderer and torturer of children.

They will vilify him for the rest of history and it didn’t matter that he was really only actively a Death Eater for 18 months, and that after that he spent the better part of 18 years trying to make up for that. 

No one was going to see him as anything less than evil.

Today’s reception at the Ministry was proof of that.

Why did he let Hermione talk him into going? He never accepted that bloody Order of Merlin, he shouldn’t have to go to the anniversary celebrations.

But she looked at him with those warm eyes and kissed him, and made him feel so brave and strong. She hung on to his arm. This warrior had chosen him to escort her. 

Then the press started with their green feathers and yellow papers, calling out terrible things and demanding to know how he slept at night.

Then when the Aurors came to clear the space, he heard them all muttering.

Potter may have called him a hero, but the rest of his workmates were placing bets on when they could arrest him.

Hermione should leave him - in fact, he should save her the pain and he should start packing now. She was still at that blasted gala, doing the Heroes’ Walk of Adoration. 

She was better without him.

He waved his wand and his old school trunk and a few other boxes began to land at his feet.

He was about to twirl it again to pack when a grey cloud swirled in front of him and there Hermione stood panting, her perfect hair messed up and her eyes flashing.

“Severus! There you are! Thank the Gods above and below. When you vanished, I had no idea where you went.” She rushed to him and ran her hands up and down his body. “Are you hurt? Did someone hex you? Harry has reprimanded the idiots who came to clear the press when he heard their accusations and I think he suspended one. There may be one with a black eye after Ron heard what happened.”

“I am fine, I have just been reminded of my station in life.”

“What?” Hermione looked shocked at him. “What station? What life? I don’t understand.”

“Hermione, I am not meant for a life out of the shadows. The public will never welcome me, and I am not even meant to be here.”

“What do you mean?” She then noticed what was on the floor at their feet.

“OH NO YOU DON’T SEVERUS SNAPE! YOU ARE NOT RUNNING AWAY FROM ME!” She stomped her foot and took his face in her hands, trying to force him to look at her.

Severus tossed his head and twirled his wand, and Hermione stopped him with a slash of her own. He hadn’t even noticed her drawing it.

“SIT DOWN.” She pointed to the sofa before the fireplace. 

He tilted his face forward, bringing his hair to shield him, and obeyed.

Hermione moved her wand and all the trunks floated away to their storage spaces. She then lit the fire and stood beside the sofa with her hands on her hips.

“Tell me what happened, Severus. I can’t make it better if I don’t know what happened.”

“I’m not like you Hermione. I’m not strong enough to let them hurt me again.”

“Then let me be your strength, Severus. I will fight the world for you.” She sat on the sofa beside him. “I’ll fight you for my world.” She pushed his hair out of her way and placed a gentle kiss on the shell of his ear.

“Because you are my world, you daft, idiot.” She pressed a soft cloth to his face, and he breathed in. Good washing powder and sunshine. How had she summoned Mam’s strong blouse? He never knew. How had she known it was his secret comfort and strength?

That was obvious.

She had her own magic.

He turned his face away from the blouse and Hermione pulled away.

“No, don’t,” he said. “You are my world, too.” He breathed in the scent of her hair. Posh soap, sunshine and Hermione. 

“Marry me.” He fingered the round buttons on her robes. 


End file.
